Criticism of minimum entry requirement for degrees

The vice chancellor of a leading university has criticised the NSW government's approach to improving teacher standards. The education department released the 'Great Teachers, Inspired Learning' discussion paper in July, and suggested that entry requirements for teaching degrees should be tougher. But the vice Chancellor of the Australian Catholic University, Greg Craven, says that approach won't achieve anything.

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ASHLEY HALL: The vice chancellor of a leading university is lashing out at the New South Wales Government's approach to improving teacher standards.

The NSW Education Department released the "great teachers, inspired learning" discussion paper in July, and suggested that entry requirements for teaching degrees should be tougher.

But speaking at the National Press Club today, the vice chancellor of the Australian Catholic University, Greg Craven, says that approach won't achieve anything.

Miriam Hall reports.

MIRIAM HALL: The federal president of the Australian Education Union, Angelo Gavrielatos, says for many people, teaching is an attractive and rewarding profession.

ANGELO GAVRIELATOS: Well I consider teaching to be the noblest of all professions.

There are few other professions where one is charged with the responsibility of moulding young people into those responsible citizens for the future.

It's a great profession.

MIRIAM HALL: But Angelo Gavrielatos says the profession lacks the social status it once had.

ANGELO GAVRIELATOS: What will make teaching far more attractive for aspirant teachers, young people, is if teaching is returned to the status that it once enjoyed.

MIRIAM HALL: The vice chancellor of the Australian Catholic University agrees.

He says a high standard of teachers is imperative. But he says setting high entry level requirements won't necessarily mean we get the best teachers into schools.

GREG CRAVEN: My view is that raising the ATAR is not the way to actually improve the quality of teachers. It is a feel-good solution, like sending people to jail for lots of time and saying that that will solve crime. It won't fix the problem.

In actual fact, it won't improve the quality of teachers.

MIRIAM HALL: In July this year the NSW Education Minister, Adrian Piccoli, released a discussion paper aimed at improving educational standards in the state. In part, it considers setting a minimum entry requirement for teaching courses, where currently, universities set their own level.

But Greg Craven says he does not believe the Australian Tertiary Admission Rank (ATAR) for teaching should be set higher.

GREG CRAVEN: The crucial quality of a teacher is not their adolescent maths score.

It's whether or not they are people with a passion to teach, a passion to get people to learn, and that's not tested by an ATAR.

GREG CRAVEN: I think the ATAR is one good measure, but it needs to be triangulated with other things. There are things like interviews, there are things like portfolios, there are things like school tests, there are things like particular tests.

My view of selecting teachers is it should be triangulated to try and (inaudible) from different points including the ATAR, because, at the end of the day, what you're trying to find is the great teacher, not the person with the number after their name at the age of 17.

MIRIAM HALL: The Group of Eight is a body that represents Australia's top universities. Mike Gallagher is its executive director.

He's worried about the standards of teaching students, and he says a good way to get top performing teachers is to set the entry levels higher.

MIKE GALLAGHER: We used to have a merit principle, or ability to benefit principle. We don't have that anymore.

So we've got students coming doing teacher education who are under-prepared as a result of their own schooling, particularly in areas like mathematics, and we know that when they go on to teach children, they pass on their fears to the children about their own concerns in mathematics.

MIRIAM HALL: And Mike Gallagher says there should be a completely new approach to teacher training.

MIKE GALLAGHER: The bachelor of education program should be taken out of the demand-driven funding system, and treated like medicine - as a separate public good area with a minimum entry of 70.

Then that leaves of options for students to do a bachelor of arts, or a bachelor of science, and then go on and do a master of teaching so that you've still got pathways to come through, but you cut off the direct entry to B.Ed. programs to students below 70.

MIRIAM HALL: He says it's particularly important that now, more than ever, that the standard of teaching graduates is high.

MIKE GALLAGHER: If you're putting people into become the next generation of teachers who themselves have not done well at school, then you're creating a problem for that next generation of teachers and for the next generations of children.

And the problem is that this is coinciding with one of those rare kind of events in demography where you're getting a surge of young people coming through the school system and a retirement bulge from the teaching profession.

MIRIAM HALL: The New South Wales Minister for Education, Adrian Piccoli, was unavailable for interview, but in a statement, a spokesperson for the New South Wales Education Department said that university training of teachers is only one of the five important areas looked at by the Government's discussion paper, and that nothing is off the table.